Harry

Sometimes, if he isn’t careful, he finds himself going down the black hole that was his memories from the war.

For the most part, Harry tries not to think about it, but then he turns the corner and the greenish light from the floo powder staining the fire grate reminds him of the flash of the killing curse, or he idently scratches at his skin and the sting reminds him of the prickle of his scar, which hadn’t really pained him since the moment he got to watch Voldemort fall.

Or sometimes it’s just a feeling, an unsettling sense that something was wrong, brought on by nothing more than Draco moving a couch cushion or Kreacher not appearing right away. It sends him down the metaphorical rabbit hole, and the only way out is to go through his familiar routine of checking, checking, checking, poking his head into shadowed corners and closets and under the bed, watching from the corner of his eye for death eaters to leap out at him, even though he and Hermione had made sure that no one could make it into his house without suffering severe bodily harm.

(She is not so merciful anymore—there are spells that she doesn’t feel the need to stop using, even though without the war there is no need for it, like she’s building a wall around the people she loves brick by brick, curse by deadly curse.)

It wasn’t a big deal, back when he was alone. He would justify it to himself, saying that everyone came out of the war with a few quirks and if this was all he had to do to get by, then maybe it wasn’t that big of a deal. But that was before he had to peek behind the curtains with Draco watching him, and check the locks three times before he coulde back into the sitting room and pretend like nothing was wrong.

Only he couldn’t pretend like nothing was wrong, because Draco was watching him.

“I can make you a calming drought for that, you know.” Draco makes the offer without looking at him, just staring at the wall, like that would make this moment of weakness easier to deal with. “Can have it ready by the time you go to sleep.”

“Can’t.” Harry would kill for one, honestly, because then maybe he could sleep through the night or enjoy an evening without feeling like his skin was stretched too tight. “Addictive.”

Draco quirked a smile, and it was a remnant of the boy that Harry used to know, the one who thought that even the ground he walked on was made of gold. “Not the way I make it.”

Which is how they find themselves in the kitchen with supplies spread around them, Draco waving a knife in the air with one hand and his wand in the other, going on about how truly abhorrent Harry is at potions. The thing smells awful, and it’s filling his house with purple smoke, but he is also doubled over and laughing so hard a stich has formed in his side, so he doesn’t really care.

“I mean it, Potter.” They generally call each other by their first names now, but sometimes when Draco really wants to tease him he slips back into old habits. “How did you ever pass potions?”

It should have been easy, this question. The correct response was to say something like I didn’t, even though it were to be a lie. Or he could have just said about the brilliance of Hermione and the academic perks of being her friend. He doesn’t say any of that.

Instead he thinks of his first potions class, of the terror that was Snape during his childhood mixed with the confusing pain of his death (Nagini, kill, thump, thump, thump, so much blood, he didn’t know a person had that much blood), Slughorn and the bozoar and a memory tipped into a vial after having too much whiskey, the heat of the potions and the glare of Snape’s eyes on his back, hating him because he hated his father, all because he loved his mother.

All of this, really, because Snape loved his mother.

“Hey.” He’d been quiet, too long, and now Draco was staring at him like he was worried. His eyes held storms in them, a fight of who he is now and who he used to be and what he wants, all of it pulling him in a million different directions. “You alright?”

Do I look alright? Do alright people need a calming drought just to breathe?

“Yeah.” He shakes himself, forces him to think of good memories, of Quidditch, but even that is tainted, honestly, because it reminds him of the Fred who is dead and the maze which was the first time he saw death and Draco, too, stealing the snitch from right under his nose and Draco dressed as a dementor and Draco doubled over because Ge had just punched him in the stomach. “Fine.”

“I get it.” And maybe he did. Harry could believe that, because if he was fine, he would not be waking up in the middle of the night toe down here and clean. Harry was messy, but he was not that messy. “Really.”

He forces a tumblr full of the potion into Harry’s hands. It is cold, and the color of lavender, so unlike the calming droughts that Ginny would sneak up to him at night during the first days after the war.

He wants to say thank you, but what he says instead is “cheers” and hopes it is enough.

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